BW Legal - Notice of County Court Claim issued for £265.70

SWB

Redx wrote: »

do not email back any forms of ID

just a scan of the N1 claim form from Northampton CCBC , to prove that it is you under the GDPR, plus state that the V5C is no longer held by the keeper due to the vehicle being sold years ago and passing on information like that is a breach of the GDPR and they should contact the DVLA direct
Thanks so much, really appreciated.

anything else is unreasonable and you should complain to the ICO


surely you did not email the SAR without attaching any proof of ID ?

No, I didnt attach any ID initially, I didnt think it was necessary?
I am asking them to resend information they have already sent and they didnt require ID to send it the first time

Fruitcake

You do need to supply proof of ID, but the ICO has said it is unreasonable for them to request any form of photo ID as they have nothing to compare it against.
Their request for driving licence or passport should therefore result in a complaint to the ICO.

A utility bill is perfectly acceptable as ID if you don't have the V5.

SWB

Good morning lovely people.

The MCOL service states:
A claim was issued against you on 18/07/2019

Your acknowledgment of service was submitted on 05/08/2019 at 20:42:12

Your acknowledgment of service was received on 06/08/2019 at 08:05:26

However, this morning, we received a letter from BW Legal stating:
'We represent PP, we wrote to you recently to advise that we have issued legal proceedings against you in the form of a County Court Claim on 18 July under claim ******.
The letter advised that unless we agreed upon a suitable repayment plan with you, or you contact us to provide us with a valid reasons for non-payment, then we would look take our client instruction and enter a CCJ against you.
While the claim has now expired and our client is in a position to enter a CCJ against you, it is still not too late to get in touch with us to discuss the options available to you to prevent a CCJ and to avoid additional legal costs being added to your balance.'

(Please excuse the grammar, this was taken word for word from the illiterate letter)

Can someone confirm that I did log my AoS in time please and that BW Legal are incorrect with their dates?
Thanks

beamerguy

This is a last ditch attempt from BWLegal to scam money from you

our client is in a position to enter a CCJ against you

TOTAL CRAP ....... it's a judge that decides if you win or not

If you did lose (doubtful) you get up to 30 days to pay before any CCJ.

You really need to tell the judge about this BWL rubbish and also complain to the SRA
https://www.sra.org.uk/consumers/problems.page

You need to highlight to the judge about ABUSE OF PROCESS
Abuse of Process ... District Judge tells BWLegal
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6014081/abuse-of-process-district-judge-tells-bwlegal

However, this could be a sign that they are ready to discontinue because they know they will be whopped by a judge

SWB

Thanks Beamerguy

No Planning Permission for the inadequate signs
No Planning Permission for the cameras
No contract with the landowner

I am not sure they have anything to fight us with to be honest?
PP have been using that piece of land to operate illegally

I will take this as another threat/blackmail from PP rather than the fact that I did not register the AoS in time
Thanks

beamerguy

SWB wrote: »

Thanks Beamerguy

No Planning Permission for the inadequate signs
No Planning Permission for the cameras
No contract with the landowner

I am not sure they have anything to fight us with to be honest?
PP have been using that piece of land to operate illegally

I will take this as another threat/blackmail from PP rather than the fact that I did not register the AoS in time
Thanks

BWLegal read this forum and unless they really want another court whooping, they best discontinue

Wait patiently

KeithP

SWB wrote: »

Can someone confirm that I did log my AoS in time please and that BW Legal are incorrect with their dates?
Thanks

If you did the Acknowledgement of Service before 4pm on Tuesday 6th August, that's fine.

And as said in post #8 above...

...you have until 4pm on Tuesday 20th August 2019 to file your Defence.

SWB

Would anyone be kind enough to have a read through my DEFENCE?

DEFENCE

I am the Defendant, ***** ****** , DOB **/**/****, and reside at ** *******

I would like to confirm that I am still waiting for documents from a SAR that was requested from Premier Park Limited and I have not received any specific details of the Claim it is difficult to mount a defence without specific details, however, I would refer the Courts to the following:

Particulars Of Claim
Unclear and Inadequate signs
No Contract with landowner
No Planning permission for signs
No Advertising Consent
No Planning Permission to run a business from the site
Abuse of process
Grace period
Generic Automatic Claims


Particulars Of Claim
Due to the sparseness of the particulars, it is unclear as to what legal basis the claim is brought, whether for breach of contract, contractual liability, or trespass.
The Particulars of Claim do not meet the requirements of Practice Direction 16 7.5 as there is nothing which specifies how any terms were breached. Indeed the PoC are not clear and concise as is required by CPR 16.4 1(a) and CPR 1.4. It just vaguely states “parking charges” which does not give any indication of on what basis the claim is brought, for example whether this charge is founded upon an allegation of trespass or 'breach of contract', so I have had to cover all eventualities and this has denied me a fair chance to defend this in an informed way. I have not yet received a response to the SAR previously requested.
However, it is denied that the Defendant, or any driver of the vehicle, entered into any contractual agreement with the Claimant, whether express, implied, or by conduct.


Unclear and Inadequate signs – no contract with driver
There was no contract with the driver.
If a contract is to be formed, upon entering the site a driver must be able to see, read, understand and agree to the terms and conditions.
I refer to Section 18.3 of the British Parking Association Code of Practice, which states: “You must place signs containing the specific parking terms throughout the site, so that drivers are given the chance to read them at the time of parking or leaving their vehicle… signs must be conspicuous and legible, and written in intelligible language, so that they are easy to see, read and understand”. I do not consider that motorists are presented with a reasonable opportunity to review the site’s terms and conditions before deciding whether to park. As such, I conclude that the PCN was incorrectly issued.
I state that on the 05/05/2015 at the site where the defendants car was photographed at Station Road Car Park there were no visual signs clearly displayed at the entrance or in prominent locations that were visable from the drivers seat. Mere signs do not help Premier Park Ltd to form a contract. VCS -v-HMRC 2012 is the binding decision in the Upper Chamber which covers this issue with compelling statements of fact about this sort of business model. In this instance, there was no contract formed whatsoever.



No Contract with landowner
There is no landowner contract nor legal standing to form contracts or charge drivers.
Premier Park Ltd are not the owners of this land and as such they cannot form a contract with the driver, I ask that Premier Park Ltd provide me with a full copy of their contract with the landowner which allows them to form such a contract. A witness statement as to the existence of such a contract is not sufficient. I do not believe there is a contract with the landowner that gives Premier Park Ltd the legal standing to levy these charges nor pursue them in the courts in their own name as creditor. This was shown to be the case by District Judge McIlwaine in VCS v Ibbotson, Case No 1SE09849 16.5.2012 (transcript in the public domain). So as regards the strict requirements regarding the scope and wording of landowner contracts, Premier Park Ltd have breached the BPA Code of Practice section 7 and failed to demonstrate their legal standing, which renders this charge unenforceable.


No Planning Permission for signs
There does not appear to be any Planning Permission for any signs. I have requested particulars of the signs, including photographs of all signs and a site map demonstrating the whereabouts of any signs.


No advertising consent
The Claimant places reliance on its provision of signage at the site and upon the content
of that signage.
The signage at Station Road Car Park is classified in planning law as an advertisement. By virtue of Regulation 30 of the Town and Country Planning (Control of Advertisements) (England) Regulations 2007 (as amended) it is a criminal offence to display this kind of advertisement in contravention of the Regulations. The penalty on conviction for the offence is at level 4 on the standard scale (current maximum £2,500) plus £250 for each day that the offence continues.
Without the correct permission Ex turpi causa non oritur actio applies and as such there can be no valid contract and as such no penalty due. The operator is put to proof that they have such permission
Ex dolo malo non oritur actio
The Claimant is not entitled to rely on an illegal or immoral act in order to profit from it, pursuant to the doctrine ex dolo malo non oritur actio. In this case, there are three acts which are illegal and/or immoral: the installation/display of the Claimant’s signage on the Land/Site, trespass and the Claimant’s disregard of Regulations which apply to it and of the BPA CoP. The first is a criminal act, the last two, while not criminal, are undoubtedly immoral and should not be sanctioned by the court. Minor infringements might be forgivable but the wholescale, multiple breaches by the Claimant, and its ignorance of the laws which apply to it, should not be forgiven, particularly when it is obliged to familiarise itself with and follow the law by paragraph A2.4 of the CoP (including consumer law, contract law, and trespass).
The rationale for the doctrine is set out in the early case of Holman v Johnson1775) 1 Cowp 341 where Lord Mansfield said:
“The objection, that a contract is immoral or illegal as between plaintiff and defendant, sounds at all times very ill in the mouth of the defendant. It is not for his sake, however, that the objection is ever allowed; but it is founded in general principles of policy, which the defendant has the advantage of, contrary to the real justice, as between him and the plaintiff, by accident, if I may say so. The principle of public policy is this; ex dolo malo non oritur action "no action arises from deceit". No court will lend its aid to a man who founds his cause of action upon an immoral or an illegal act. If, from the plaintiff's own standing or otherwise, the cause of action appears to arise ex turpi causa "from an immoral cause", or the transgression of a positive law of this country, there the court says he has no right to be assisted.”
The principle was reaffirmed in RTA (Business Consultants) Ltd v Bracewell [2015] EWHC 630 (QB) (12 March 2015) where, at paragraph 34 of the judgment the above passage was cited.

The Court’s attention is also drawn to Andre Agassi v S Robinson (HM Inspector of Taxes)[2005] EWCA Civ 1507. Whilst not wholly aligned to the issues in this case it has been produced because of the principle it extols that no one should profit from their unlawful conduct. The Court’s attention is drawn to paragraph 20 of the judgment
“It is common ground that, whatever costs may be recoverable by a litigant in respect of professional services such as those provided by Tenon to the appellant, they cannot include the cost of any activities which are unlawful”.
Paragraph 28 continues –
“cannot on any view recover the cost of activities performed by Tenon which it was not lawful for them to perform.”



No Planning Permission to run a business from the site



Abuse of process
"The claim contains a substantial charge additional to the parking charge which it is alleged the defendant contracted to pay. This additional charge is not recoverable under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012, Schedule 4 not with reference to the judgement in Parking Eye v Beavis. It is an abuse of process from the claimant to issue a knowingly inflated claim for an additional sum which it is not entitled to recover,

This order has been made by the court of its own initiative without a hearing pursuant to CPR Rule 3.3(4) of the civil procedure rules 1998 "

Whilst this does not set a precedence in a county court and each judge is entitled to make their own decision, EVERY judge should be invited to read this case decided by a District Judge

Claim number: F0DP201T District Judge Taylor
Southampton Court, 10th June 2019.

BRITANNIA PARKING GROUP LIMITED T/A BRITANNIA PAR

Claim number : District Judge Grand (Newport IOW)
County Court of Newport (IOW) 2 July 2019
It is ordered that:-

1. The Claim is struck out as an abuse of process.

Reasons:
The Claim contains a substantial charge additional to the parking charge which it is alleged the Defendant contracted to pay. This additional charge is not recoverable under the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 Schedule 4 nor with reference to the judgement in Parking Eye v Beavis. It is an abuse of process for the Claimant to issue a knowingly inflated claim for an additional sum which it is not entitled to recover.




Grace periods
Has any Grace Periods been considered? - breach of BPA CoP
The BPA’s Code of Practice states (13) that there are two grace periods: one at the end and a separate 'observation period' at the start. For the avoidance of doubt this is NOT a single period with a ceiling of just ten minutes, and the authority for this view is in this BPA article by Kelvin Reynolds, BPA Director of Corporate Affairs where he states on behalf of the BPA that there is a difference between 'grace' periods and 'observation' periods in parking and that good practice allows for this:
https://www.britishparking.co.uk/News/good-car-parking-practice-includes-grace-periods?fbclid=IwAR347R1ULeXKZvPz7ArWZ3hBl-5-1EV949-dc4oHbU0NQreZcvRZDrqanQg
“An observation period is the time when an enforcement officer should be able to determine what the motorist intends to do once in the car park. Our guidance specifically says that there must be sufficient time for the motorist to park their car, observe the signs, decide whether they want to comply with the operator’s conditions and either drive away or pay for a ticket,” he explains.
“No time limit is specified. This is because it might take one person five minutes, but another person 10 minutes depending on various factors, not limited to disability.”
BPA (18.5) states ''if a driver is parking with your permission they must have the chance to read the terms and conditions before they enter into the contract with you''.


Generic Automatic Claims
The Claimant’s solicitors are known to be a serial issuer of generic claims similar to this one, with no diligence, no scrutiny of details nor even checking for a true cause of action. HMCS have identified over 1000 similar sparse claims. I believe the term for such conduct is ‘roboclaims’ which is against the public interest, unfair on unrepresented consumers and parking companies using the small claims track as a form of aggressive, automated debt collection is not something the courts should be seen to support.
On the basis of the above, I request the court strike out the claim.


I believe the facts stated in this Defence are true.

Must be emailed tomorrow
I am off to read the new threads for any more help
Many thanks

beamerguy

No Planning Permission to run a business from the site

And you have proof of this ?????

You have understood the abuse of process

It will now be interesting to see what the rookie legal they send to court will say about abuse of process and what the judge says. This is in light of BWLegal's case in November

SWB

beamerguy wrote: »

No Planning Permission to run a business from the site

And you have proof of this ?????

You have understood the abuse of process

It will now be interesting to see what the rookie legal they send to court will say about abuse of process and what the judge says. This is in light of BWLegal's case in November

I can not find any Planning application going back to 1987 to run a business from this site. Thanks Beamerguy.